As a professional philosophy degree-haver, I like to sit down every now and then and really think about the things that matter. Things like ethics and politics and even just plain old numbers and what makes a number a number. But then I sometimes like to go into a hyperbolic state of introspective comatose, peer into the greater workings of the mythoverse, and claw my way through eons of questions and answers until, at last, I am born again with those gems of human wisdom that can only be got with the utmost courage to challenge everything one knows embedded on mine own heart.

This is one such moment.

So let’s get to it. The Halo characters you’ve come to know and love/tolerate as pizza toppings.

Master Chief and pepperoni. Both are totally classic. You can get other pizza toppings, but you’ll never beat the ol’ pepperoni punch. And both pepperoni and Master Chief are accessible. A man of few words, he isn’t exactly complicated or sophisticated, but he gets the job done. Every single time. And like pepperoni, it’s probably best if you don’t know the details of what made Master Chief Master Chief. One other similarity: they’re both flat, but neither of them are square, and fortunately, the flatness is starting to go away (at least for the Chief it is).

Ah, Cortana. Pepperoni is the go-to topping for everyone, but there’s
something to be said for those who favor extra cheese. Cortana, while
she is important in her own right, really enhances Master Chief’s
abilities and performance. She’s the best sidekick a one-track-minded
killing machine could ask for, and nothing goes with pepperoni better
than cheese and more cheese. But there is the risk of too much cheese.
Spoilers ahoy! We last see Cortana, at least in the games,as a villain,
nearly kidnapping Master Chief and his team before blasting off to
continue her diabolical plan of ruling the galaxy. And in similar
fashion, cheese, our first true love in pizza, can become a ruler of
all, smothering the masses of other toppings until nothing is safe in
that cheesy cacophony of cheese. Add to this the cheesiness of the line
“Don’t make a girl a promise you can’t keep,” and all such awkward
sexual tensions between Cortana and Master Chief (and the player), and
you’ve got yourself a cheesy situation. I’ll only say cheese one more
time: cheese.

You know, the name is a real dead giveaway because (more spoilers!) if
you’ve at least played the first game, you know that Guilty Spark, who
at first was so loyal and helpful, eventually betrays Master Chief and
humanity, advocating for total destruction of the galaxy before letting
the Flood take over. In a similar way, sausage, the hearty meat topping,
promises good texture and flavor, but heavy hangs the stomach of those
who eat sausage. It’s just so filling and oily! This, combined with the
heartburn that it will eventually give you, makes for a somewhat
mournful, albeit interesting, dinner.

The Arbiter - Banana peppers
Not enough praise is given to banana peppers. They’re hot, but not too
hot. They’re complementary, but they pack a punch. They are sort of odd
by themselves, but hey, live a little. The Arbiter, like the quaint yet
proud banana pepper, provides an excellent tension to the whole scheme
of what’s going on. He’s got some bite, but it’s a pleasant bite. People
will likely pick a pepperoni pizza over just a banana pepper pizza, but
you’ll have more respect for yourself if you try just a banana pepper
pizza. It’s a shame an Arbiter-only game doesn’t exist. Yet.

Damn mushrooms and their damn mushroomness. Fie upon’t! The Gravemind,
like mushrooms, is a type of parasitic monster that thrives off of the
dead bodies of those it mercilessly kills. It unleashes spores to spread
its evil (like mushrooms), looks like the rotted flesh of a month-old
cadaver (like mushrooms), and one bad Gravemind can ruin a planet in
record time, just like how a few mushrooms ruin a good pizza.

Dr. Halsey is the abusive mother of the Halo universe. Uncaring,
uncompassionate, and ice-cold, Halsey does technically have your best
interests in mind. She wants humans to live and thrive, but her means of
promoting this are both neglectful and abusive. Her love is a harsh one,
devoid of warmth, just like an all-veggie pizza without cheese is devoid
of what you really want, which is cheese. An all-veggie, no-cheese
pizza is just a clever disguise parents use to make you eat your
vegetables. Or a way for people to convince themselves that what they’re
eating is healthy.

You want to be cool, punk? Then you order your pizza with jalapeños on it! That way everyone from here to ONI will know not to mess with your
BAMF self. Same goes for the Didact. The Didact, one of the last of the
Forerunners, has taken it upon himself to reclaim the Mantle of
Responsibility that humans were to have. Him versus humanity, and
humanity almost lost. But (there’s a SPOILER coming just down yonder!)
The Didact faced an untimely death, at least in my opinion, at the hands
of Cortana. He, like the Flood, could have been a cool villain for 343
Industries’ Halo Trilogy, not just the fourth game. And in similar fashion,
jalapeños are badass ... but their death also comes with a sting, one
that foretells the doom-poop you’ll be ekeing out half a day later.

Bacon has never ruined a pizza. I work at a pizza shop, and I can’t even
think of a pizza it couldn’t go on. Even the non-pizza items are improved by bacon. Cheesy
bread? Sure. Salad? Why not? Cheesy fries? Hell yeah. And Thomas Lasky
manages to bring that kind of energy to the table. He’s never not a cool
character. I mean, damn, just look at the guy!

Locke tries. He really does. And if you’re the kind of person who
prefers that a series open up its character base, then he’s a perfect
fit for the job. When we got to play as the Arbiter, no one complained,
so why should they complain about Locke? He’s cool, he’s collected, and
he isn’t a pushover ... but he’s not the Master Chief. He’s competition for
the Master Chief, just like how ham is competition for pepperoni. Ham
tastes great on things. There are whole sandwiches dedicated to ham. But
on a pizza, pepperoni reigns supreme, and all ham can do is try to be
more like pepperoni. Still, good effort.

Tomato on a pizza, especially if it’s the only topping, is just sort of
weird. I mean, you already have the tomato-based pizza sauce. Why would
you need more tomato? Sure it’s in a different shape and has a
different texture, but I mean, c’mon. It’s pointless! You need an ingredient that complements the tomato sauce,
not one that loses itself trying to one-up the sauce. The Warden
has the same issue going on. In Halo 5, we already have an A.I.
character that’s screwing things up, i.e. Cortana. (Yes, I’m aware that
she was the cheese earlier, but she’s going to be the sauce in this
analogy now. I’m the author, and I can do what I want.) We don’t really
need the Warden to be a badass A.I., so he ends up coming off as extra.
The wrong kind of extra. We should have had the Didact, but, you know,
whatever.

BONUS CHARACTER!

Who doesn’t love Nathan Fillion? He’s like the Thomas Lasky of TV. He’s just good anywhere ... except maybe in Halo? I’m not saying he is, though. Not to me. I like his character. He’s charming, he’s the comedic relief, and he can fit into a number of roles and plots. So he’s like pineapple. Pineapple is good. No one really contests that. However, they do contest what pineapple is good for, and some DO NOT like it on pizza. I’m fine with pineapple on pizza. There are some cases where it wouldn’t work, but there are times it really shines--*cough cough* barbecue *cough*--and so I can appreciate it as a pizza topping. But not everyone, certainly. So Fillion, who plays Buck, maybe ought to go back to appearing in other sci-fi universes, or perhaps one in particular. And I bet you can guess which one....

Welcome to Fandom Friday, a weekly blog meme hosted by yours truly. I know, I know, today isn't a Friday, but this week is special. It's Bad Poetry Week!

Bad Poetry Day is August 18, and to celebrate, the Fangirl Initiative is going to be publishing a fandom-themed bad poem or two each day leading up to it. Since we missed last week, this Fandom Friday is going to last for two weeks and... drumroll, please... we'll be featuring YOUR bad poems! Yay! Anyone who links up between now and August 18 will have a chance to have their bad poems featured not only on the site, but on all of our social media platforms as well!

What is Fandom Friday?

Fandom Friday is where you, our awesome readers, get involved with The Fangirl Initiative community! Every Friday, we'll post a question or topic that spans all fandoms—books, movies, music, anything—because we want to see what you love!

How do I join?

Easy! Head on over to your blog, answer the question however you want to, and then add your link. Once you've done that, check out some of the other links, maybe leave a comment or two, and enjoy the camaraderie that comes with being a part of a fandom.

Make sure to give us a link back, whether through a traditional link or this nifty button:

As we mentioned earlier, this week's Fandom Friday is dedicated to fandom-themed bad poetry. What is a bad poem? Anything you want it to be! A lazy limerick, a horrible haiku, an alliterative paragraph that just involved you hitting enter a bunch of times... anything. To provide inspiration, we'll be posting a few bad poems each day on the site and on social media.

Remember, if you link up between now and Friday, August 18, there's a chance your bad poems will be featured! (DM us or leave a comment if you'd like us to tag you on social media, and provide us with your links.) Here are a few questions to get you started:

What fandom(s) do you know the most about?

What can you write a poem about? A character? A plot point?

What do you love most about it?What do you absolutely want in your poem?

Sunday, August 13, 2017

This was what we'd lost. I struggled to hold back my emotions as the video ended. The coming of Calamity had broken this world in more ways than one. Prof should have still been there, teaching those children.

1) Prof sounds like a fantastic teacher, and 2) GEEZ MY HEART. Don't mind me while I pick up the pieces. Carry on.

Now I recognized a hole inside me. For a short time in that drowned city, I'd known true freedom, powered by twin jets of water.

Why is this just hitting me now? Of course David liked the flying aspect of the spyril, not the water aspect. He is another version of Steelheart! Turning stuff to metal, flying... yeah. I don't know why I thought that his powers would have something to do with water—it makes way more sense this way.

"Hmm? Oh. One could force you to speak in rhyme. The other could speak in any made-up language anyone anywhere had imagined."

Quenyarin? Klingon? Dude, I want this power! (I promise I'm not turning evil. But the idea of being able to speak in any made-up language I want, right off the top of my head? Sounds fabulous.)

Chapter 37

"I don't know," I said. "Could be nothing. There were a lot of powers being flung around that room—maybe there was a leftover forcefield, or... or maybe some pocket of another reality..."

I sidled up to Abraham. "The two of them are talking," I said.
"You expected maybe clucking?"
"Well, shouting. Or strangulation."

He may be brilliant when it comes to Epics, but David is remarkably clueless when it comes to how normal people work.

Could Tia have been wrong? I'd decided that she wasn't, but now—confronted with one last shot at stopping Prof—I wavered. Some thing about Prof and his powers didn't add up.
What was it Prof feared?

And we're back to that bit. Prof's weakness is certainly less easy than most of the other Epics they've faced.

"That was foolhardy," I called to him. "Stop trying to put me out of a job!"

Great. Now even Abraham, Mr. Sensible, is becoming Mr. Epic.
Gah. That makes me giddy with excitement. This is going to be the coolest throwdown ever.

Chapter 39

"You sure you don't want to pilot it, lad?"
I shook my head. "You have more experience with the tensors, Cody."

Not to mention that if they don't work for you any more, the rest of the team is going to get suspicious.

"Broke my jaw," Cody said with a laugh. "Don't poke, kid. That's what I learned." He seemed not to care much, though a broken jaw sounded like a pretty big offense to me.
But then, who hadn't wanted to punch Cody on occasion?

So we have Cody the Crazy Scot who's going to run around in the tensor suit... does that make anyone else nervous? Just me? Okay.

"Silly?" Larcener asked. "You think it isn't obvious? A man does not study, learn, obsess as you have because of hatred. No, these are the signs of lust. You have sought a father amoing the Epics, a lover among them." He stepped toward me. "Admit it. You want nothing more than to be one of us."

Gah, I wish Abraham would punch this guy in the jaw.

We're almost to the Epic showdown of the century! What are you guys hoping to see when the team finally faces Prof? (And who else really, really hopes Larcener bites it?)